Welcome to my Blog. I have been a Primary School teacher in New Zealand since 2000 and currently teach at an International Baccalaureate (IB) school. For 5 years I ran a Digital Classroom and was the school's lead teach for Mathematics. In 2014 I started a new journey as a specialist teacher of Visual Art for my entire primary school. On this blog you will see examples of student experiences and teacher reflections. I invite you to leave a comment about what you see and read. Enjoy your tour.

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Tuesday, August 11, 2015

Signs for your Maths Wall Display

Hello friends,

Maths week is sneaking up quickly and this is a good time to reflect on our classroom maths displays. Are they helpful to the students? Are they interactive? Do they show visitors the maths that is really happening in your classroom? There are so many 'pretty' maths posters on line that you can download for each area of your maths programme. I have files overflowing with laminated wall display charts and posters. But at the end of the day, I only used these seldom and with discretion, asking the question, "How will this help my students improve?"

When I sat down to write interactive maths games for each knowledge outcome from stages 4-8, I also thought about how students could be the masters of their own learning. Over the years of interviewing students for assessment I noticed how keen they were to come back and be interviewed on their next bit of knowledge, when they knew what it was they needed to master.

So I incorporated this into the pack too. Following an IKAN test to establish their knowledge and next steps, students get a stage tracking sheet for their maths book of the knowledge they need to master and the games they can play to master them.

There are also wall posters explaining each piece of knowledge, to put up onto your maths wall. Students names could also be added to remind them what they are currently working on. Students track their progress on their sheet in their maths book so that they know exactly where they got up to during the previous maths session. They can play a game as many times as they want to and when they feel ready to be interviewed, they let you know.

You can quickly do this at the start of a focused maths group session as you wait for the group to gather. Keep the teacher checklist pasted into the front of your group modelling book for quick reference.

As the programme gathers momentum, and students realise that they set the pace of their progression, you will be blown away by how quickly they progress through the knowledge stages.

Another bonus of this is students can set their own maths homework goals by keeping a student checklist in their homework books as well. Once you sign them off in an interview, they can update their homework sheet themselves and move onto their next goals to practise with mum and dad - meaningful differentiated homework - bonus :)

This week I tidied up my wall display headers / banners for my knowledge displays and wish to offer these to you all as freebies. I have used super cute illustrations by Philip Martin which you will love.

Two options are included. One is a simple banner header which you can print to preferred size, another is a display mat version you can print A3 and laminate to group you knowledge signs or group names onto. This will help keep your display tidier. There is a colour set to match each stage of my Knowledge Games Resource.

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Welcome...

Currently I teach whole school Visual Art in Auckland, as a specialist teacher and also support ESOL learning needs as needed. I have been teaching in the IB curriculum framework since 2008, having started this at Sherwood Primary school. Here I also worked as a Planning Team Leader and head of Maths for several years. Sherwood also had a pilot programme for Digital Classrooms and I was lucky enough to teach a 1:2 iMac supported Y4 class for 4 1/2 years. Wow! awesome P.D. I post regularly on my blog about classroom trialled lessons and ideas as I have a passion for supporting and encouraging our young teachers coming through as well as sharing with fellow international bloggers. Please comment on posts you read as I would love to hear from you.